Truck driver Gary Cartwright wrapped himself in a tale of wartime heroism when his lawsuit seeking big damages from Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. went to trial this summer.
His attorney, Chicago personal-injury lawyer Jeffrey M. Goldberg, related how Cartwright had risked his life in Vietnam in 1974 to rescue the wounded from a downed helicopter and later turned down a Medal of Honor.
A Cook County jury listened to the story and awarded $9 million to Cartwright, 40, who was seriously injured in April 1986, when his truck hit a bridge support near Bloomington, Ill. Jurors also ordered Goodyear to pay another $2 million to Cartwright’s wife.
Now, though, lawyers for Goodyear appear to have shot a few holes in Cartwright’s story.
They contend that the stories of Cartwright’s exploits in Vietnam and the offer of a medal are untrue, a ploy for sympathy.
Cartwright was a clerk-typist at Ft. Bragg in North Carolina on the day he purportedly was rescuing the wounded and leading an attack on an enemy position in Vietnam, according to a post-trial petition and written arguments filed in Circuit Court last week by Goodyear.
Cartwright sued Goodyear in 1988, alleging the crash was the result of a defective tire.
At the trial, which ended Sept. 2, Goldberg told jurors about a letter urging Cartwright to accept-though the letter used the word “except”-the Medal of Honor. The letter, ostensibly from an Army general at Ft. Morris in Maryland, noted Cartwright’s service as an Army Ranger, a counter-terrorist specialist, an expert combat medic and a light aircraft pilot, among other skills.
“It is now abundantly clear that the letter read to the jury was a completely fraudulent document and that every word of testimony and argument regarding Gary Cartwright’s distinguished war record was utterly false,” Goodyear contends in written arguments.
Goodyear is asking that the verdict be set aside or that a new trial be granted.
Attached to Goodyear’s post-trial petition is a letter from Army Maj. Michael J. Wawrzyniak of the military awards branch, who says the document is fraudulent. He noted that the fort in Maryland does not exist and that the Army was no longer involved in combat in Vietnam when Cartwright enlisted.
Goldberg insisted Monday that Cartwright had served in Vietnam and that Goodyear’s arguments are “totally irrelevant.”
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The new findings have nothing to do with Cartwright’s injuries or what he contends was a defective tire, Goldberg said. But he declined to discuss in detail the now-disputed letter, except to say he was “looking into it.”
The trial lawyers for Goodyear were Michael H. West and Gregory W. Beihl at Pope, Ballard, Shepard & Fowle.
The company is being represented in the post-trial proceedings by West and Biehl, as well as by Edmund W. Sinnott, a senior partner at the firm, and former Judge Nicholas Bua, of Burke, Bosselman & Weaver.
West says in an affidavit that he saw the letter only minutes before Goldberg started asking Cartwright about its contents. He said he assumed it was genuine.
It may be. But it does seem strange no one looked twice at a document from a purported general instructing Cartwright that, if he really did not want to “except” the Medal of Honor, he should submit a letter to that effect and have it stamped by a “Notoriety Public.”
Moving up
The new managing partner at legal giant Winston & Strawn is James M. Neis, 47, a corporate lawyer in the firm’s Chicago office.
Neis was the choice of the firm’s chairman, James R. Thompson. His appointment was approved Monday by the executive committee.
– Legal briefs. Pastel drawings of local steel mills, done by artist Kathleen Dunn, will go on display starting Thursday in the law offices of her brother-in-law, criminal defense lawyer William Postl Murphy, in suite 1400 at 343 S. Dearborn St. Murphy grew up on the South Side. . . . Joan Fencik, a partner at Wildman Harrold Allen & Dixon, is joining a management “reform team” at the Chicago Park District. Effective Jan. 1, she will be the $70,000-a-year lawyer in charge of litigation for general counsel Randy Mehrberg, who was at Jenner & Block until August.
– A correction. An item in last week’s column inadvertantly left out the name of partner J. Warren Whitesel in a mention of his firm, Laff Whitesel Conte & Saret.